We all remember the very first time our l’il hearts went boing. Today, the Chicks share their very first crushes, civilian and/or celebrity.

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Kellye Garrett

My first real crush was probably second grade and it was a kid named Jeff. I vividly remember the exact moment I fell in love…rather, in crush. The teacher had assigned him to read a passage in some book. As he read, I noticed something wrong with his nose. I can’t remember if it was a scar or what. But I can remember being  like, “This is the man for me!” In terms of the all important celeb-crush, that distinction belongs to a child actor named Ernie Reyes, Jr., star of the cult classic The Last Dragon. There was just something about that bowl haircut that my heart go pitter patter. I just found a clip of it on YouTube (Click here and skip to about three minutes in.) Needless to say, I no longer see the appeal. This is probably a good thing.

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Lisa Q. Mathews

My first crush, alas, cannot be named here on the World Wide Web. He was quite possibly the shyest kid in second grade and (I suspect) is probably now the shyest man on the planet. Miraculously, he liked me, too. But in the middle of fourth grade he moved away—to freaking ENGLAND. I almost fell out of my desk chair (literally) when he showed up again in my eighth grade chemistry class, looking like a taller Harry Potter (with dimples). But then his family went and moved back across the pond AGAIN that summer, so we never even made it to high school (or anywhere, for that matter). For years I wondered where he’d ended up. Total coincidence:  I unexpectedly found out about 3 weeks ago. He lives about an hour away, but guess he’ll never know.

First celebrity crush? I never had one, really (see above). But I loved Matt Damon in the Bourne movies. And he seems like a nice guy.

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 Ellen Byron

My first memorable crush was in first grade and the lucky recipient of my affections was Steven Holtz. We lived in Queens, and I have a memory of him showing up at my house in a Mighty Mouse tee shirt that had a cape made out of the same tee shirt fabric built into it. We walked down either Marathon or Douglaston Parkway together, probably back to his house. Yup, two six-year-olds walking by themselves along a busy four-lane thoroughfare. Those were the days.

My first celebrity crush was on Leonard Whiting, who played Romeo in Franco Zeffirelli’s film, Romeo and Juliet. Either him or Bobby Sherman. (I once took a picture of the TV set when Bobby was on the show, Here Come the Brides. God, I loved that show.) But I have a better story about Leonard Whiting. Years after my crush, when I was in my twenties living in New York, I came home to this message from my mother: “Ellen, call me. I have terrible news.” I couldn’t reach her for HOURS. I was in a total panic. I finally got through to her and was like, “Oh my God, Mom, what’s wrong?!”

Her answer: “I just saw Leonard Whiting on TV. He’s fat and he’s bald.”

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Vickie Fee

In grade school, the first boy I thought of as not being yucky was a classmate named Joey. He had dreamy hazel eyes and strawberry blond hair. And he could actually talk to girls without feeling the need to show off or chase us or pull our hair. (Some grown men could take a lesson here.) I developed a crush on him in third grade and, unfortunately, his family moved that summer and he didn’t return to my school in the fourth grade. However, at some point in the fourth grade I forgot all about Joey and moved on to having a super crush on Donny Osmond. I had a poster of him hanging in my bedroom, collected his records, read up on him in Tiger Beat magazine, and even started wanting to wear purple all the time because it was his favorite color.

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Marla Cooper

When I started kindergarten, apparently I came home from school crying because my neighbor-friend Kenny wouldn’t sit by me. Thwarted by love at such a tender age, I opted out of crushing for the rest of my elementary school career. The first person I remember having a serious crush on was in eighth grade. There was this boy named Scott who was “a total fox” — curly brown hair that was just long enough to make him look like he should be in a rock band, intense brown eyes, and dimples. Sigh. Looking back, he was so much more mature and, well, sexier than all the other pimply-faced fourteen year olds. Almost more like a tenth grader. Which means he probably was either held back a couple of years or he was an undercover narcotics agent posing as an eighth grader. Unfortunately, he had a super-common last name, so I can’t google-stalk him to find out!

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Cynthia Kuhn

Parker Stevenson from The Hardy Boys tv series in the late 70s was probably my first celebrity crush. The combination of his sleuthing savvy and those amazing blue eyes had me smitten. Oh, and of course his perfect swooping hair. He was All Over Teen Beat magazine. D-R-E-A-M-Y. (It’s probably not a coincidence that my husband also has blue eyes, and the same shade of brown swoopy hair, now that I think about it…never made that connection before. Ha.)

Readers, who was your first crush?

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